Modern computer systems make extensive use of network computing and network data storage systems. Such use has proliferated in recent years, particularly in distributed or virtualized computer systems where multiple computer systems may share resources when performing operations and tasks associated with the computer systems. Such computer systems frequently utilize distributed data storage in multiple locations to store shared data items so that such data items may be made available to a plurality of consumers. The resources for network computing and network data storage are often provided by computing resource service providers who leverage large-scale networks of computers, servers, and storage drives to enable customers to host and execute a variety of applications and services. The usage of such network computing and network data storage allows customers to efficiently and adaptively satisfy their varying computing needs, whereby the computing and data storage resources that may be required by the customers are added or removed from a large pool provided by a computing resource service provider as needed.
The proliferation of network computing and network data storage, as well as the attendant increase in the number of entities dependent on network computing and network data storage, have increased the amount of data to be stored. Because consumers have a variety of usages for stored data, different data objects are stored for varying amounts of time. Securely storing data for varying amounts of time can cause significant demand for resources needed to protect the data while it is stored and to retrieve the data when the data is accessed.